Hitherto, for example, a digital still camera has been known as an apparatus which can digitally record and reproduce an image. As one of use methods of the digital still camera, there has been proposed a method whereby position information (latitude, longitude) of a photographing spot is obtained and recorded onto a recording medium together with image data, and when the image data reproduced from the recording medium is displayed, the position information is displayed onto a reproduction picture plane by a numerical value. In the digital still camera, when the user wants to use a map image, it is necessary to prepare map images having position information onto the recording medium.
However, there is a problem such that even when there is means for obtaining present position information, if the present location is out of a range of the prepared map, the map cannot be used and the obtained position information cannot be effectively handled.
Also in case of preparing map images having the position information, as a present situation, a special modification is necessary and the map images cannot be easily obtained.
Further, in the digital still camera, a map image format in which map images can be recorded onto a removable recording medium and used does not exist. A map image format in which a latitude and a longitude of arbitrary one point on a map can be used does not exist, either. In the digital still camera, therefore, a map image format which is used to display a map image so as to be overlaid onto an image having other latitude and longitude or a latitude and a longitude of a present location or the like does not exist.
It is, therefore, an object of the invention to provide data recording apparatus and method, data reproducing apparatus and method, data recording and reproducing apparatus and method, and a map image data format, in which not only a recording and reproducing function of images can be provided but also a latitude and a longitude of arbitrary one point on a map image recorded as a map onto a recording medium can be displayed by a single portable photographing apparatus.